


The Furnace Duct

by katnisseverdeeen



Category: The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Canon, Attractive Haymitch Abernathy, District 13, F/M, POV Katniss Everdeen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-30
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2018-02-27 14:03:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2695748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katnisseverdeeen/pseuds/katnisseverdeeen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“To being survivors.” He cheers, raising his flask in a half-hearted toast towards me.</p><p>In the dim lamplight, the hollows of his cheeks look deeper, as do his dimples. I am amazed to see how limp his hair has become. It resembles straw that has been combed back, and obscured from view beneath a cap. I can see the scar just above his lip from his Games. He hasn’t shaved in a few nights, and a stubble is creeping across his jaw.</p><p>The shadows cast across his face from his misshapen nose - the result of several breaks from drunken falls or brawls - make him look menacing, but when he shifts, the darkness vanishes, and his expression is one of great sadness.</p><p>I cannot tell if I prefer this to his general indifference.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Furnace Duct

“To being survivors.” He cheers, raising his flask in a half-hearted toast towards me.  
In the dim lamplight, the hollows of his cheeks look deeper, as do his dimples. I am amazed to see how limp his hair has become. It resembles straw that has been combed back, and obscured from view beneath a cap. I can see the scar just above his lip from his Games. He hasn’t shaved in a few nights, and a stubble is creeping across his jaw.  
The shadows cast across his face from his misshapen nose - the result of several breaks from drunken falls or brawls - make him look menacing, but when he shifts, the darkness vanishes, and his expression is one of great sadness.  
I cannot tell if I prefer this to his general indifference.  
He’s close - too close, as I have been avoiding human contact for as long as I can remember now - enough that I can smell the liquor, strong and potent, and the traces of the standard lemon soap on his skin. I can smell the sweat on his skin from the hot air the furnace emits.  
Together, we crouch in a crawlspace between the housing pods and the evacuation level of District Thirteen, drowning our sorrows beside the furnace with a bottle of smuggled goods. I had tried to keep him sober, but old habits die hard, and I figured he could use the companionship. Or perhaps it was me who needed a friend - I wasn’t sure.  
“To Peeta.” I murmur, feeling a numb, tingling sensation building up deep within me. The dullness I experienced at the mention of the baker’s son was familiar, at the least. He was the bane of most nightmares, and the cause of most welled-up tears I was too stubborn to shed.  
I’m surprised when he hisses: “Don’t.” Turning to him, I think I recognize anger, but when he speaks again, his voice is too gentle to be mad. I’m not used to such tenderness with him, and it, too, startles me. “You couldn’t have known what was - Katniss, we couldn’t have helped him. The Peeta we knew was gone the moment the damn Capitol got to him.”  
We hadn’t spoken much of Peeta since his death. Most people tend to air on the side of caution when discussing him around me, as if afraid that I would shatter upon hearing his name. It had been easier to pretend that his death had never happened like that. Denial was the state I lived in most of the time when involving Peeta.  
“Hand it over.” I respond with a sharpness I didn’t intend to vocalize. I found comfort in the fact that he doesn’t seem insulted, and just passes me the flask. Our hands touch, and contrast: his warm, large, calloused fingers meet mine, which are cold and pale, and nibbled down to stubs.  
“To Peeta.” He murmurs. I know he’s hoping to make me feel better, but instead, I feel a flush of sadness. He accepts the flask when I hand it back to him after taking a large swig. As an afterthought, he adds: “And to the cause.”  
“When have you ever cared about the cause, Haymitch?” I ask with a laugh. The sound is startling because I haven’t heard it in so long: I was never a giggling girl to begin with, and the Games had erased much of whatever sense of humor I had. No wonder I had been proclaimed so unlikable during the Games, and needed Peeta’s help so much - Peeta.  
His cheeks are tinged pink now, and he’s hiccuping, but there’s a brightness in his blue irises I haven’t seen since he and Chaff were reunited at the Quarter Quell. “I care about some o’ it. You know me, sweetheart - a real go getter.”  
I laugh again, though this time, the chuckle is quieter and possessed a sad edge to it. “You and me both.” I respond after a brief silence, reaching out for the flask again. The space between us is limited, but to pass me the flask, he lifts off his position on an overturned ice box. Due to his inebriated state, he stumbles and hands on me, grumbling apologies and curses.  
When he looks up, his nose brushes my jaw, and all I can notice is exactly how long his eyelashes are. I feel like I’m moving in slow motion, struggling through a hazy mist, as I try to reposition to better suit Haymitch, but the result is not much better: now, his nose is nuzzling my jaw, and his lips fall on my neck.  
“I’m sorry,” He cries, because he’s too close, and because he’s too drunk. I can as he curses himself for being so stupid, and so drunk, as he struggles to his knees, and he’s trembling as he does so. “God, I didn’t - I’m really sorry. Katniss, Peeta shouldn’t have died. No, it should have been me. You know, I should’ve taken his place, and he could be here with you.”  
There’s such strong self-hatred behind his words that I flinch. “No.” I respond, shocked to hear his death wish. “No, it shouldn’t have.” I tell him, and I can’t explain further, because it seems to simple to me: Peeta’s death is not, nor should it be, interchangeable. I can live without Peeta out of necessity, because I had to, and because I always could have.  
But without Haymitch - I wasn’t so sure.  
“I’m sorry, Katniss. It should’ve been me.” He’s shaking now. Haymitch has been reduced to a sad, sorry, sloppy mess before me in a tiny, warm space that suddenly feels less like a safe place and more like a pressure cooker.  
From someplace deep within me, pure instinct takes over, and I wrap my arms around Haymitch’s heaving shoulders tentatively. “No. No, I need you, Haymitch.” I tell him softly, and it dawns on me that I’m not lying to make him feel better: because that’s not what I do. Because that’s really how I feel.  
I can see it on his face: he’s thinking he’s too old, and too wrong, and too messed up, and too broken, not like Peeta, who was handsome and in his prime and so good to the core. His hair was matted, his hands knotted through it. He whispers, “sweetheart,” but it no longer sounds like the punch line of an unfamiliar joke.  
We remain there, clutching on to one another, for a long time. I can’t remember how long, but I can remember how the smell of his hair became familiar, and how our breaths slowed to one, and our heartbeats matched through the tops of our hideous pantsuits.  
The call of a distant alarm beckoned us from our positions, and a glance we exchanged said all we needed to: it would not be discussed, for this was an argument he could not win. Not when I was on the defending side.


End file.
